Friday, February 08, 2013

Numbers are numbers


I have mentioned my dislike for numbers before.  Let's take two for a moment: weight and BMI.  If a man loses 2 pounds of fat but gains 2 pounds of muscle, he sees a zero on the scale.  In that man's head, his body didn't do anything because the numbers are the same.  It makes it a bit easier for someone to quit the journey.  My issue with BMI comes from weight lifters.  You could have a low body fat percentage but because your body contains so much muscle weight, you would be considered fat due to how much you weigh and how tall you are.  Then there is mathematics.  So, I tend to not want to qualify or quantify my success numerically.  Well, until yesterday.

As you can see, I weighed in about 4 times starting in May.  The numbers on the far right are weight.  From a high of 222, I am now down 18 pounds.  Blood pressure is to the left next to the date and that is looking better as well.  There are even hydration percentage and BMI numbers in there somewhere.  Having too many numbers can be confusing.  It is good to feel great but, now, when someone asks, I can tell them something other than how many pant sizes dropped or belt loops I've had to adjust.

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